1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to an apparatus for and methods of accounting and, more specifically, to an apparatus for and a method of disbursements accounting requiring only a single manual imprinting of the information pertaining to a particular transaction while providing multiple reproductions of the imprinted information. This invention relates further to an apparatus useful for maintaining personal checking records including a journal of disbursements and various accounts collected in a ledger.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In the past, financial intercourse has necessitated the maintenance of records as a managerial tool. Commonly, disbursements were made by a written negotiable instrument, or check. The check was issued, or drawn, to a payee, who cashed the check which eventually returned to the possession of the drawer. The balance in the checking account was monitored by maintaining a journal or register which was commonly, but not universally, incorporated in the same cover as a supply of undisbursed checks. As a check was drawn, the check number, identity of the payee and amount were recorded in the journal. The journal was a running account of the balance in the checking account, and was correspondingly debited for checks drawn and credited for deposits made. Since the recordation in the journal required a second writing, the ever present danger of transcription errors was presented. Such errors commonly included transposition of digits, etc.
Effective financial management, whether for an individual or a business enterprise, required analysis of the ongoing character, magnitude and distribution of disbursements. To this end, various accounts were established to collect and develop a record of disbursements made for particular purposes. Most commonly, the respective accounts were bound in a common ledger. The posting of particular expenditures from the journal to an account also required a third writing, again giving rise to possible transcription errors.
Subsequently, commercial type bookkeeping systems were developed which utilized sheaves of sequentially bound checks each having a reproducing carbonized strip on a back portion of the check and an alignment mechanism so that the check was self positioning over a particular journal entry prior to imprinting, to permit the relevant portions of the information on the face of the check, such as amount, payee and date, to be reproduced on the journal. However, subsequent posting of the transaction to an account still required transcription. A need existed for a disbursements accounting system which would allow a check to be drawn and a journal entry and a ledger entry to each be made from a single imprint of the pertinent information.
Consumer checking was conducted using a well known checkbook apparatus provided with a series of bound checks and a checking account register, or journal, coupled in a common cover. The commercial type checking systems capable of reproducing a single imprint from the check onto the journal were bulky, and utilized the sequentially bound sheave of checks, which two features were incompatible with consumer transactions due to the conflict of the physical dimensions with the convenience and mobility of the user. Furthermore, the conventional checkbook as used by the consumer made no provision within that apparatus for establishing expenditure accounts collected in a ledger, much less for reproducing the information required for the ledger as a part of a single imprinting operation when drawing the check. A need existed for a consumer checking apparatus having a reasonable size so as to be compatible with consumer mobility, capable of recording journal entries from a single imprinting of the information on a check, and further preferably capable of recording, without requiring a transcription, the information imprinted on the check in a manner to permit inclusion of that information in an account portion of a ledger which was an integral part of the checkbook apparatus.